When the Ricks away
by Weskette
Summary: ... The mice will play.  What if T-Dog had headed into the woods with Glenn instead of Daryl? AU Better Angels


**When the Ricks away...**

The basement of Hershal's farmhouse was large with one main room and three extra off it. Lori (immediatly) claimed the largest for Carl, Rick and herself. The others weren't claimed, though, because it had been decided they'd be used for storage of the food and water. Rick had left Andrea, Hershal and Daryl 'in charge'. It was more like Hershal would do most of the decision making with input from the rest of them and Andrea and Daryl would protect them best they could. Both were situated by the door in the corner of the room by the door. Andrea had her gun in her lap and Daryl was whittling at a hunk of wood.

"I don't understand why Rick wouldn't have you out there looking for Randle," she sighed, shaking her head.

" 'm enjoying your company too," he mumbled sarcastically.

The blonde rolled her eyes. "That's not what I meant, Daryl, and you know it. I just meant that you're our best tracker. Our only tracker. Wouldn't it be smarter for you to be hunting him down?"

He shrugged. "Sometimes it's better not t' question the stupidity around here."

She nodded, agreeing. They sat in a comfortable silence for a moment, Daryl whittling, Andrea sweeping her gaze over the room. "You always on watch duty?" he asked.

"Hm?" She looked up, biting her lip.

"You're acting all protective."

"So?"

"I ain't saying it's a bad thing. I think it's pretty smart."

"Yeah, well, apparently I'm just tanning with a gun in my lap," she said bitterly. She sighed then and rolled her shoulders.

"Who the hell told ya that?" Daryl asked gruffly, looking up from his whittling.

"Lori," she muttered so no one could hear it but him.

"What the hell does 'at bitch no 'bout anything?" he asked, raising an eyebrow and going back to work. "She wouldn't know danger if it walked up and bit 'er in the ass."

Andrea chuckled. "When you're right, you're right."

She smiled, absent-mindedly picking at a loose thread on the hem of her shirt. She was thinking about the past. She did that a lot recently. Dale was dead, Amy was dead. What else was there to do? She thought of the memories she had shared with them, whether it was going to see Amy star as a lead in the musical Les Miserables, or when Dale took them in because they had no vehicle, only a bag of clothes between the two of them and the gun in Andrea's hand. In a way, Andrea's mind was providing an oasis from the desert that was life.

"Hey, you been okay?" Daryl asked, eyes flickering from his work to her and back to his work.

"After Dale's...?"

"Yeah."

"I guess I am. Maybe I've learned to cope... It's a lot easier to handle than Amy's death..." Andrea trailed off, swallowing down the lump in her throat that she got every time she thought of Amy. Daryl spoke after a moment.

" 'Maybe with more time, she'll learn what death really is. Which is where the pain stops and the good memories begin'." She tilted her head, giving him a confused look. "It's a line," he explained. "From that old movie, Pet Cemetary. Freaked me out when I was little."

She smiled. "What?" he asked after a moment when she hadn't turned away from looking at him.

"Daryl Dixon, you can be sweet when you want to, can't you?"

He shrugged as color rose to his cheeks. "Sometimes, I guess..." he mumbled.

"I'm surprised you'd admit to it," she spoke, raising her eyebrows.

"Ain't no use hidin' something from people ya gotta be around..."

"It's no use, huh?" He shook his head. "But what if it was a secret that you didn't want any body to know?"

"Keep it one, I guess. Dunno if it help much, not if it was with a group like this." Daryl inclined his head to the others on the far side of the room. Though the biggest offenders of this, Lori, Rick and Shane, weren't there, she understood his point.

"You ever wonder where you'd be if the world hadn't ended?" she asked, voice quiet again.

"Definately not sittin' next t' a lawyer from Florida," he chuckled, meeting her eyes.

"What's wrong with lawyers from Florida?" she joked. They both laughed lightly.

Daryl stopped carving and set down his knife. "Nothing, nothing. But I'd probably be in my home. Huntin' for food every day, fightin' with my brother when he used my place to crash with some bitch he found at a bar."

She shifted in her seat, leaning back and stretching her legs. "I'd probably be in California. Amy and I were heading there when shit hit the fan. Or maybe we would've made it back home already. But I definately wouldn't be sitting in the basement of a farmhouse in Georgia with a handsome loner who has a strange attraction to crossbows."

"Handsome?" he asked.

"Hey, you said not to hide something from someone you had to be around everyday." She shrugged. "I'm not lying."

He wasn't sure what to say to that seeing as he wasn't used to getting compliments. "You ain't so bad yourself."

She gave him another smile and leaned foreward. In one fluid movement, she grabbed the collar of his jacket and pulled him in. It was a longer kiss than either had expected and both enjoyed it. It wasn't exactly the most romantic of places, seeing as it was in a basement with other people milling around, the closest one being seven feet away, but it was enough. He smiled at her, the corners of his mouth twitching up. "Oh look," she said. "You're even better looking when you smile."


End file.
